In their assault to the top of Pikes Peak, Dunne and Vahsholtz will be riding modified Ducati Multistrada 1260 Pikes Peak motorcycles. Wanting to know more about these beasts, we reached out Ducati North America, to see what light they could shed on the v-twin race bikes.

They came back to us with an interesting list of changes, to make these the fastest Multistradas you have ever seen.

Ducati is set to return to America’s Mountain, announcing today that it would race in the 2018 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb with riders Carlin Dunne and Codie Vahsholtz.

Carlin Dunne (who is today’s big birthday boy) is a former record-holder at Pikes Peak, and was the first rider up the 156-turn course in under 10 minutes, while Codie Vahsholtz is the current middleweight record-holder at Pikes Peak.